een them. Finally, neither
little family spoke to the other. And then, one day, there was a great
bustle about Jim's house. A wise old woman went waddling in, and later
the doctor came. That night the proud husband and father was treating
his friends, and telling them it was a boy, and his name was to be
James Johnsonham, Junior.

For a week Jim was irregular and unsteady in his habits, when one
night, full of gin and pride, he staggered up to a crowd which was
surrounding his rival, and said in a loud voice, "James Johnsonham,
Junior--how does that strike you?"

"Any bettah than Isaac Johnson, Junior?" asked some one, slapping the
happy Ike on the shoulder as the crowd burst into a loud guffaw. Jim's
head was sadly bemuddled, and for a time he gazed upon the faces about
him in bewilderment. Then a light broke in upon his mind, and with a
"Whoo-ee!" he said, "No!" Ike grinned a defiant grin at him, and led
the way to the nearest place where he and his friends might celebrate.

Jim went home to his wife full of a sullen, heavy anger. "Ike Johnson
got a boy at his house, too," he said, "an' he done put Junior to his
name." Martha raised her head from the pillow and hugged her own baby
to her breast closer.

"It do beat all," she made answer airily; "we can't do a blessed thing
but them thaih Johnsons has to follow right in ouah steps. Anyhow, I
don't believe their baby is no sich healthy lookin' chile as this one
is, bress his little hea't! 'Cause I knows Matilda Benson nevah was
any too strong."

She was right; Matilda Benson was not so strong. The doctor went
oftener to Ike's house than he had gone to Jim's, and three or four
days after an undertaker went in.

They tried to keep the news from Martha's ears, but somehow it leaked
into them, and when Jim came home on that evening she looked into her
husband's face with a strange, new expression.

"Oh, Jim," she cried weakly, "'Tildy done gone, an' me jes' speakin'
ha'd 'bout huh a little while ago, an' that po' baby lef thaih to die!
Ain't it awful?"

"Nev' min'," said Jim, huskily; "nev' min', honey." He had seen Ike's
face when the messenger had come for him at the brickyard, and the
memory of it was like a knife at his heart.

"Jes' think, I said, only a day or so ago," Martha went on, "that
'Tildy wasn't strong; an' I was glad of it, Jim, I was glad of it! I
was jealous of huh havin' a baby, too. Now she's daid, an' I feel jes'
lak I'd killed huh. S'p'osin